The present invention relates, in general, to a combination portable boat dock and lift.
The prior art includes boat docks which are permanently installed with posts driven into the lake or river bottom and the ramp fixedly attached to the posts for mooring the boats and for boarding and alighting from the boat and includes boat lifts which are removably positioned adjacent the permanently-installed boat docks and which have a wheel-less main frame and a lifting frame which is raised and lowered with a winch mechanism. Permanently-installed boat docks are indeed old in the art but do not provide the user with the convenience and flexibility of mooring his/her boat wherever the user wants. Wheel-less boat lifts are also old in the art, and normally cooperate with the permanently-installed boat docks and cannot be conveniently moved about as desired by the user.
Another known prior art is the flotation boat dock which comprises an elongated frame structure having a plurality of planks closely mounted one to another on the frame structure for the user to walk thereupon and which further comprises a plurality of flotation barrels attached beneath the frame structure to provide buoyancy to the frame structure so that the boat dock floats upon the water and can be conveniently slid out of the water but aren't easily movable since the flotation boat dock typically is without wheels for easy transportation thereof. Boats can be moored to the flotation boat dock which do not have boat lifts attached thereto because the flotation boat dock doesn't have the stability to support a boat raised above the surface of the water.
Another known prior art is a BOAT TRAILER FOR TRANSPORTING A BOAT, U.S. Pat. No. 4,029,227, which comprises a longitudinal frame element having a pair of side members interconnected at their forward ends by a cross member and a transverse member; a gripping means mounted along the length of the longitudinal frame member for gripping the bottom of the boat to immobilize the boat for the transportation thereof; a wheel system mounted on opposite ends of the transverse frame; and adjustable means for raising and lowering the boat as desired by the user for unloading and transporting the boat. The BOAT TRAILER FOR TRANSPORTING A BOAT is specifically constructed to transport a boat not to dock a boat and/or lift a boat out of the water as is the present invention.
There are no combination boat docks and boat lifts of the type presented in the present invention. There is a definite need for combination portable boat dock and lift which overcomes all the problems associated with mooring boats and lifting a boat out of the water.